From Player To Npc

Shingi used FILTH EATER to clean the girl up and some Fire Mana of his to dry her up, as not all water on her got filthy to be affected by his spell.

She was wearing some magic robes like his, just adjusted a little to fit her body better.

She seemed to be younger than Annoue a few years ago because Annoue seemed to look older than one of her age. After all, she had some harsh years since her mother left.

Shingi tried to check her eyes to feel if they contained the same energy as his, and he found out that they had some power but felt somewhat different from his, but sometimes felt the same. It was like it kept changing.

He had tried the same thing at Harbin in the past and noticed that his energy felt different but had a stable feeling same as his.

He knew little about the eyes and the powers one could have with them, as Harbin considered him too young, even if he knew that he technically wasn't that young.

"Should we search the chests and the rest of the room?" [Mizuneko]

"Yes. But we should be careful. Tycoon pay attention to her while Phoenix and I check the jars. Mizuneko and Hineko search the chests. Check for both magical and physical traps first."[Shingi]

He and Hineko needed to separate since they were the two with the highest PERCEPTION, so they could detect physical traps, while Mizuneko and Little Phoenix could check for magical ones.

Of course, Shingi could check for both by himself, but it was safer to have two people work in two tasks than one person work in two.

Checking the jars, they weren't trapped, and they contained some old burned herbs used in many rituals, not necessarily magical ones, and one of them was for funerals, which fit the current scenario.

The herbs were useless since they mainly got burned, and it's been years since they were used, but the vases themselves could probably earn them some coins. But since they were part of the ritual, even if there wasn't a diseased, Shingi left them be as it could make some Gods angry.

There seemed to be the girl's belongings on the chests, primarily clothes, armor, and a double-bladed scimitar.

This was a rare weapon to find, as non-elves forbid its design from outsiders.

As for them to sell this weapon or even gift, it was an infrequent event.

It wasn't the most powerful weapon, and to use it, one needed special training to use both blades.

Its design was simple, two blades similar to those used for a scimitar connected with a handle between them. When the user held the weapon vertically, one blade was pointing up, and one was pointing down, while his hand was in between.

It was a light weapon, fitting the style of people aiming for speed than pure force.

One reason that nobody outside of Elves produced those weapons was that the ones who tried found a tragic end.

It wasn't known why or who could be behind those tragic ends, but no weapon smith was ready to take the risk for something that small.

There were some coins around, some healing potions, and potions with effects that Hineko wasn't familiar with yet.

But Shingi recognized them, and he was excited for a few of them.

"Wild Tycoon, you should have this one. Hopefully, we won't need this."[Shingi]

Shingi gave her a potion with this weird stone in it and was surrounded by some blueish liquid.

"What is that? When would it be the best time to use it?" [Wild Tycoon]

"They made this potion to strengthen the users STR to that of a giant, and more specifically a Stone Giant. It will increase your size a bit, probably at the size of Volig, so not fully giant, and will toughen your skin to increase your natural defense. With your RAGE benefits, especially if you keep increasing it, it will be a deadly combination. But making this potion is hard to do, so don't count on finding more of those and use it only if necessary as its effects last for at most an hour. Also, I would advise closing your nose and drinking it as fast as possible when that time comes. Its smell and taste aren't the best." [Shingi]

He looked over the rest of the potions, which were of a specific effect to fit someone else, and he brought one to Mizuneko.

"This is up to your elements. If you drink this, it will allow you to breathe out an ice breath. It won't use your mana but will still count like your mana, so you can boost it a bit once you are using it, just the time is a lot shorter. We will train on a similar effect with purely using mana, and if you reach decent progress with that, then the potion will be too easy to use in full power. It will ice trap the foes in front of you, and if you are careful about using its power, you can use it multiple times."[Shingi]

The rest of the potions were simple enough, like potions to heal HP, which they separated them to make sure everyone had some at all times.

Shingi kept the rest of the potions at his Spatial Ring until they needed them.

He didn't mind taking those things as he knew they weren't part of the ritual so that he wouldn't anger anyone. Also, this was a typical adventurer routine.

As they were over with looking around the place, Shingi went to the room's door while he told Wild Tycoon to wake up the girl.

The girl woke up, and this time it didn't attack the first person she saw.

She looked around with a confused look, and Shingi noticed that her eyes were black this time, even from that distance.

"Hello. Are you ok now? Sorry for our behavior before, but we didn't like you attacking our leader. So who are you, and why were you in a freaking coffin?" [Wild Coffin]

The girl looked at Wild Tycoon while keeping her confused look all the time.

"HEY. I asked you a question. WHO…. ARE… YOU?" [Wild Tycoon]

The girl started looking left and right to the other people in the room, and she seemed fascinated by them.

Wild Tycoon stood up, turned around, kicked the air, and started walking away from her.

"I GIVE UP. Phoenix, you try." [Wild Tycoon]

Tycoon was never rarely the best with patience, especially after meeting Ragnarock. She got stronger from their meeting, but her personality changed a bit. She became a little more reckless at her fighting style but learned to focus more on her RAGE to increase the force of her hits.

Little Phoenix sighed as she kneeled in front of the little girl and looked her in her eyes. She resembled Annoue, who she hadn't met many times, but she understood how much she meant to Shingi.

"Can you understand me? Blink once if yes."[Little Phoenix]

The young girl looked towards her, blinked once, and then continued looking around over every different thing in the room.

"Please, if you can focus here, I would appreciate it."[Little Phoenix]

The girl looked at her and blinked once. This time she kept looking towards Phoenix.

"Can you not speak?" [Little Phoenix]

The girl blinked once.

"From now on, blink once for yes and twice for no. If it is neither, do nothing."[Little Phoenix]

Shingi got impressed with the simple idea that Phoenix had and how fast she came up with it.

"Are you Annoue?" [Little Phoenix]

No blinks.

"Oh…. eeeehh. Do you have a name then?" [Little Phoenix]

Two blinks this time.

"Do you know who that person over there is?" [Little Phoenix]

She pointed towards Shingi, and after the girl looked at him and back at Phoenix, she blinked twice.

"OK…hmmm. Do you know why you are were in the coffin?" [Little Phoenix]

Two blinks.

"How about….? Do you remember anything from before we wake you up?" [Little Phoenix]

Two blinks once again.

Little Phoenix turned towards the rest.

"Can you guys think of any questions?" [Little Phoenix]

Shingi had slowly started making his way towards the girl, paying attention to any changes in her eyes.

Fortunately, none came.

"Does Angel's Feather mean anything to you?" [Shingi]

The girl turned towards Shingi, and after some silent moment, she blinked once.

But Shingi could read some further confusion after she responded like she didn't know why she gave this answer.

She seemed to be confused and excited about everything around her like it was the first time she saw them.

"Do you know how to fight?" [Shingi]

This time she answered quickly with one blink.

"Do you want to join us?" [Annoue]

One more blink came fast, as she didn't seem to spend time to think about her answer.

"Then I guess you should get ready for the trip. Phoenix and Tycoon help her put her equipment from the chest since it is something meant for her. We will wait outside. Come, you two, let's move on."[Shingi]

He gave the girls some privacy, and he was sure that he could trust this girl. He wasn't sure why his mother kept her here, but he was confident that she would have some special abilities.

It took some time for the girls to help her get ready.

She wore leather armor with some similar design to Shingi's robes but was also far apart. They most likely got designed by the same person.

She had the double scimitar with her, but this one could be split into two normal scimitars that she had one at each side. This wasn't typically part of the design but wasn't unheard of but rarer.

Fortunately, one couldn't tell that they were part of a double-bladed scimitar when they were separated, as some Elves were too fanatic against the idea for non-elves to have this weapon.

Shingi noticed she had a Mana Pool and could tell her Element was Air, just like Annoue's.

Shingi offered her to be his student, which she accepted right away, but she didn't accept anyone's recruit invites.

She seemed to follow Shingi's commands, but she didn't follow his command to accept the recruitment from someone else, and he couldn't recruit her himself since he wasn't a Blessed One, and only Blessed Ones could recruit NPCs.

At least he could check her status, which enabled him to check her HP, SP, or MP, just not as fast as with the Party's standard UI.

He noticed her stats to be like Annoue's, with only her INT as 10.

But she had more Skills than Annoue used to have, and many of them were Weapon Skills.

Her class was a fully earned Arcane Blade, but she still was level 1.

Though, her Skills Ranks were high, with most being at Master Rank and only a few being at Base.

They needed to level her up a bit, which would be more challenging since she wasn't joining their party, so they couldn't just share their exp.

But still, they could let her have the last hit, which provided a decent percent of the final rewarded exps.

Also, since the monsters around were of a lot higher level than her, they would give her even more exp for defeating them.

So they climbed down the mountain, and fortunately, they had an extra pair of climbing equipment for their new team member.

"Shouldn't we give her a name? I doubt using your sister's name is something we want to try. "[Mizuneko]

Shingi gave it some thought before he turned toward her.

"Let's go with just An."[Shingi]

She nodded like agreeing on the proposal, even if it seemed a pretty simple choice.